Field
The present patent application relates to sit stand products, more specifically, to desktop and tabletop articulating arm base sit stand devices.
Description of Related Art
Sit stand devices typically allow an office worker to conduct their tasks in a sitting position and a standing position by raising or lowering a work surface (e.g., with a keyboard and a mouse along with a monitor or several monitors).
Monitor arms are similar to some of the current sit stand devices. They are used on work surfaces, for example, to hold flat screen computer monitors in place. Since one or several of the flat screen computer monitors are relatively light, the fully articulating monitor arms allow the flat screen computer monitor to move through its full range of motion without being challenged by stability issues. Typically, these types of devices use lightweight ball or pivot type joints. They have several segmented arm sections while they lack a work surface.
Adapted monitor arms as sit stand devices have started to gain momentum in the market today. Device manufacturers simply took a monitor arm added a work surface to turn them to articulating sit stand devices. The problems that arise from this type of execution is that the articulating assemblies fold vertically and are not robust enough overcome the instability created by the multitude of articulating sections. This instability makes them impractical for varied tasks other than to hold a monitor and keyboard.
Sit stand towers allow one to go from a sitting position to a standing work position. They can be directly situated onto a current work surface. As sedentary office and computer work has been deemed as harmful, there has been heightened awareness and need for devices which allow one to work efficiently in both the sitting and standing position. Typically, these types of tower devices allow a device such as a laptop computer to raise and lower with the user, but the more practical products have large enough surface space or mounts to support one to two monitors and a keyboard such as, for example, the Ergotron WorkFit-S. The Ergotron device clamps onto the front (i.e., away from the user) of a work desk, supports a moveable keyboard and mouse surface that travel up and down a track within a vertically protruding tower. The tower also houses a lift aid that helps the moveable surface to move up and down the tower track easily. This type of device typically does not have a position lock and will move when disturbed with a minimal amount of force. U.S. Pat. No. 9,717,329 shows an example of this type of prior art device.
Sit stand surface based units can accommodate larger work surfaces than both the articulating arm based units and the tower based units. The sit stand surface based unit can be directly situated onto a current work surface. The sit stand surface based unit is limited to a predictably linear path of travel (i.e., basically up and down movement). Since the work surface is larger, the sit stand surface based unit has a latch mechanism that allows one to stop in various vertical positions within the limited linear path of travel. Since the larger work surface units are heavier and typically hold more weight, a lifting aid of some sort is also incorporated to help the operator/user to lift the larger heavier work surface and loads upwards when moving to a standing position. U.S. Pat. No. 9,113,703 is an example of this type of prior art device.
An ergonomic sit/stand keyboard support mechanism is disclosed, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 6,076,785. This patent discloses a sit stand device specifically designed to support a keyboard. The device mounts to the underside of a desk, slides in and out and articulates up above the work surface on which it has been mounted. Down below the work surface, it has been mounted by way of a four bar or parallel linkage means with an integrated pneumatic gas spring. Additionally, the device has adjustably raising and lowering pivot plates. The over-articulation and weakness of the connection points limit this product to function only as a keyboard support.
As this category of products matures, there are many different types of sit stand device offerings in the market today. However, for at least the reasons presented above, a sit stand table may not be the right device for the office or home office and another type of device is needed. The present patent application endeavors to provide various improvements over prior mentioned examples along with any similar examples that may not have been mentioned or included. The present patent application discloses a device that takes into consideration these important observations noted above and solves them in a manner to be unique and beneficial to those seeking these types of systems in the market.